In the spring of 2000, my oldest son, Casey Sheehan, was at a crossroads. He was completing his third year at a community college and he had finished all of his lower division requirements. Casey earned an AA in Theatre Arts and was hoping to transfer to Sacramento State and get his teaching degree to teach elementary school. However, working full time and going to college was taking its toll on Casey.
Somehow, an Army recruiter got hold of him at the right time and he was beguiled by the promises of instant wealth (a $20,000 signing bonus that somehow metamorphosed into $4500 when he finished basic training); a specialty that was attractive to him (Chaplain's assistant) that was transformed into being a humvee mechanic when he reached basic and promises of education that never, ever materialized. After Casey was KIA in Iraq, we got a check for $1200; his educational benefit that was taken out of HIS pay for the first year he was in the Army: One hundred dollars a month for twelve months. Not even one penny of interest for the entire time that the government had his money.
In 2002, Andy, my youngest son, graduated from high school. Uncle Sam allowed Casey to come out on leave to attend his brother's graduation and the pictures of my four children together at that time break my heart. This was after the tragedy of 9-11, but before the insane invasion of Iraq. Andy was not much of a student and did not do as well as Casey when he tried to take classes at Solano Community College. Not every person is designed to take an academic route, so that was okay, but I worried how was Andy going to support himself without an education? One day, almost miraculously, an apprenticeship job with Operating Engineers, Local 3, fell into Andy's lap. He was hired to be a land surveyor's apprentice as age 19 and now at age 24, he is a journeyman in a great union with great pay and benefits. These great opportunities, however, are few and far between for our young people today.
Andy's union bent over backwards to help him make up his apprenticeship classes after Casey was killed and Andy is getting a quality education while he is getting on the job training. I thank Andy's lucky stars everyday that he was saved from joining the military: a fate worse than death, for sure.
Any day now, my daughter's son, Jonah, will make his appearance into this world. Because of his Uncle Casey's sacrifice, our family will do everything in our power to make sure Jonah does not become cannon fodder or a paid assassin for the Military Industrial Complex. There will be no more naïve, but well-intentioned mistakes in the Sheehan family! Even more important than this, however, the tale of three sons should be instructive to the US population as a whole.
A recent AP article lamented the Democrat's "politically painful" choice of funding BushCo's occupation of Iraq for another year. Of course, what the Democrats really mean is that they have to fund Iraq and Afghanistan past the November elections because the leadership is counting on the fact that we Americans have short-term memory when it comes to their callous political expediency. However, now, with the economy in virtual free-fall and the mess in the Middle East worsening by the day, we are all beginning to feel the sting of the personal cost of this occupation.
As a political candidate against the number one Bush enabler, Nancy Pelosi, I have felt the immense personal pain of her politically "painful" decisions and I have a plan that would help our country (and the world, especially Iraq) recover from 8 years of the Bush Horror and prevent more Caseys and promote more Andys and Jonahs.
First, as an emergency measure, we need to start bringing our troops home from Iraq and Afghanistan. We are borrowing from Jonah's future to fund these occupations at 16 billion a month. We will need to use some of that money as reparations to these countries and to help our veterans reintegrate wholly into society. It has recently been estimated that 18 vets per day commit suicide (6-7 Iraq vets) and 250 more per week try, but are not successful. Secondly, instead of using this money to fund death and destruction, we immediately institute, or re-institute jobs' programs that put our unemployed neighbors back to work repairing bridges, levees, roads, schools and other infrastructure that has been crumbling for the last few decades.
Such barriers to fair trade, as NAFTA and other "free" trade agreements need to be repealed and we need to rebuild our trade unions to be the bargaining force that they once were. We need a place for our young Andys to go to learn positive trades with decent pay and benefits.
Finally, to prevent more Caseys, we need to reduce our Pentagon budget to a rational and moral one that would be strong on defense, but not strong enough to be able to staff almost one thousand bases world-wide, nor to be able to embark on illegal wars of aggression. Our "defense" budget has now surpassed an obscene one trillion dollars a year (not counting the twin disasters of Iraq and Afghanistan) and the nation that spends the second most is, with over triple the US population, China, at 65 billion. Adjusting for the fact that we can be the "mightiest" nation on earth, I propose a DOD budget of 70 billion dollars.
We can use the money we save every year to truly reduce taxes on the middle and working classes and invest in institutions and programs that truly make a nation strong: health care, education, jobs, and sustainable forms of energy and farming.
The vampire of US fascist militarism is sucking this country and world dry. To ensure a healthy world for Jonah and all of our children, the monster needs to be stopped!
CindyforCongress.org
Cindy Sheehan is the mother of Spc. Casey Austin Sheehan, who was KIA in Iraq on 04/04/04. She is a co-founder and President of Gold Star Families for Peace and the author of two books: Not One More Mother's Child and Dear President Bush.
The views expressed in this article are the sole responsibility of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of this website or its editors.
I applaud your efforts. You have been a tireless crusader & deserve everyones vote. With your permission I would like to post this article to my site- www.votestrike.com (General Strike 9/11/08)
THANKS, for all you do.
by
chris rice (111 articles, 144 quicklinks, 35 diaries, 233 comments) on Sunday, May 4, 2008 at 9:33:48 PM
For all that you have been doing, including holding the Democratic Party and those who support them for their complicity in this horrific, illegal, immoral and racist war and occupation on Iraq.
Thank you for showing us what real speaking truth to power really is.
Sadly and predictably Air America and The Nation magazine will never possess your courage and integrity and will never allow you or other real dissidents air space or print.
Peace, Justice, Accountability
by
Michael Cavlan (15 articles, 0 quicklinks, 6 diaries, 538 comments [131 recommended, 2 rejected]) on Monday, May 5, 2008 at 12:06:54 AM
"Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. The cost of one modern heavy bomber is this: a modern brick school in more than 30 cities. It is two electric power plants, each serving a town of 60,000 population. It is two fine, fully equipped hospitals. It is some fifty miles of concrete pavement. We pay for a single fighter plane with a half million bushels of wheat. We pay for a single destroyer with new homes that could have housed more than 8,000 people. This is, I repeat, the best way of life to be found on the road the world has been taking. This is not a way of life at all, in any true sense. Under the cloud of threatening war, it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron. ... Is there no other way the world may live?"
- Dwight D. Eisenhower
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Michael Fury (3 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 88 comments [2 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Monday, May 5, 2008 at 9:46:18 AM
Add to their reluctance to end the war, that the congress, both sides of the aisle, have profited mightily from their private holdings in oil and defense stocks by some $196,000,000 ($196 Millions so far).
Cindi, there us no FDR on our horizon and until there is, cannon fodder is all any of us are to these Mongoloid sick sonsofbitches, none of which believe in any god except the green one with $ sign.
What they don't know is that, and this may not be as comforting as I mean it to be, they will all burn in Hell. Run against the , coward in District 8 San Fran who has the hots for Bush and beat her. The Jews have a saying, "The Best revenge is to outlive your enemies..." I add to that "and to know that they are burning in Hell," some of them like Cheney even as his body blimps around Planet Earth.
Good Luck in San Fran district 8.
by
Professor Emeritus Peter Bagnolo (144 articles, 1 quicklinks, 95 diaries, 1317 comments [5 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Monday, May 5, 2008 at 12:54:15 PM
Reply: YOUR GOD WOULD BE WORSE THAN HITLER IF HE EXISTED!
And god who would inflict infinite punishment by burning His victims forever would be worse than Hitler. Fortunately this Omnipotent Monster does not exist and you should be ashamed of yourself for glorying in your sick imaginings.
The Jewish-Christian-Islamic-Zoroastrian God is merely the ancient oriental despot writ large. Instead of a mere earthly torture chamber, He has an Everlasting Torture Chamber. Again, we are fortunate that such an Allmighty Tyrant does not exist!
Robert Halfhill
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rhalfhill (3 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 325 comments) on Tuesday, May 6, 2008 at 11:01:03 PM
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